I often admonish my brother for labeling too many things he dislikes as “stupid.” That word should be reserved for that which goes beyond the merely foolish or inane to the really, really stupid.

At the Second Vatican Council, the Catholic Church wiped its hands of its “long century” of defensive reaction to the modern world and climbed into what it hoped would be a new era of dialogue. However, it takes (at least) two to dialogue and over the last 50 years the Church’s willingness to talk about important issues has not often been reciprocated by the secular world.